Mr. Christopher Hewelson.
Mr. Richard Foster.
Mr. Adam Hewelson.
Mr. Bates, a schoolmaster.
Mr. Larkin.
Mrs. Dunstervile,
her daughter-in-law,
her maiden-daughter.
Mr. Dwine’s daughter.
Mrs. Grace, her daughter.
This account was given by Mr. C. Hewelson and Mr. R. Foster, two of the beforenamed spectators: and when it was related, a servant of Mr. C. H., being present, did confirm the truth of it; affirming, that he and others of the servants being then together at Poins-town, in another place, saw the very same sights, and did very much wonder at them. Finis.
This wonderful wonder is worthy of preservation, for the very reason that renders it scarcely worthy of remark. It was a practice, before the period when the preceding tract was printed, for partisans to fabricate and publish strange narratives in behalf of the side they pretended to aid, with the further view of blackening or injuring those whom they opposed. Such stories were winked at as “pious frauds,” and found ready sale among the vulgar. As parties declined, the business of the writers and venders of such productions declined, and some among them of desperate fortune resorted to similar manufactures on any subject likely to astonish the uninformed. The present “True Account” may be regarded as a curious specimen of this kind of forgery. The pamphlet was printed in London; the scene being laid in Ireland, it probably never reached Poins-town, and if it even travelled thither, the chance is that there were only a few who could read it, and certainly none of those few were interested in its contradiction. At the present time it is common in Somersetshire to hear a street-hawker crying, “A wonderful account of an apparition that appeared in Hertfordshire,” and selling his papers to an admiring crowd; the same fellow travelling into Hertfordshire, there cries the very same “Apparition that appeared in Somersetshire;” and his printed account equally well authenticates it to a similarly constituted audience.
NATURALISTS’ CALENDAR.
Mean Temperature 42·80.